


the state of you and i

by clarkesquad



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/F, i called jroth he confirmed this, this is your new canon please embrace it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-15
Updated: 2015-05-15
Packaged: 2018-03-30 15:33:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3942100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clarkesquad/pseuds/clarkesquad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>the version of 2.14 where there were two kisses, clarke initiated the first one, and she definitely didn't pull away.</p><p>clarke and lexa make out for funsies and it gets a little heated. forget bodyguard of lies. this is your new canon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the state of you and i

**Author's Note:**

> fuck off, asmy.

Lexa doesn’t question it when Clarke invites herself into her tent at night.

Clarke knows she’s used to it by now. And she’d be a liar if she didn’t admit that she found that comforting. It’s reassuring, knowing that Lexa understands why she feels safer around her. Safer to toss around the less conventional battle strategies that Lexa’s generals might shoot down in one of their conferences. Safer to admit her doubts about their plans, about their army, about herself. Safer to ask questions.

So that’s what she does, after she gives Lexa a few minutes to wake up. She shuffles around the tent until she hears Lexa’s breathing shift.

Clarke faces away from her and grips the table.

“What if we’re wrong? Cutting the power doesn’t disengage the locks?”

Lexa sounds exasperated when she says, “Your people said it will,” But there’s only a few seconds of silence before she hears her sitting up, shedding herself of the blanket she sleeps with. “You should rest, Clarke.”

Her coat makes more noise than she does as she tugs on her clothes from behind Clarke.

“We could blow the doors manually.” Clarke nods. She’s sure Raven could do it. She burned Lexa’s army to the ground with a bullet in her back. She blew up a bridge that had survived a nuclear holocaust. One little sealed door couldn’t survive what Raven Reyes was capable of. She was an advantage that they could and should use.

Lexa slides next to her with about as much personal space as they’ve gotten used to having between them. At least when they’re alone. Everything’s different around other people. They don’t have to ask themselves why. They know. They know there’s something deeper between them. An understanding.

“Plans don’t last very long in battle.” She knows that. “Tiring yourself with questions already asked and answered is a waste of energy.” She knows that too.

But that’s not what she needs right now. She’s getting kind of sick of Lexa telling her how to feel. Just because Lexa has the patience of some ancient reincarnated Commander soul doesn’t mean that Clarke is going to be able to tolerate another lecture about responsible leadership.

Lexa has the audacity to sigh at her and Clarke snaps.

“Fine, then tell me. What am I supposed to do right now?”

The smile she offers her is close to cocky, nothing like Heda kom Tri Kru and everything like the girl who had greeted her in TonDC with a cheeky “ _Clarke of the Sky People has honored us with her presence_ ”. Lexa turns herself around to lean against the table beside Clarke and then says, “Perhaps that’s not a choice you should leave in my hands.”

She’ll admit it, that throws her for more than a second. She half expected another lecture, and she half expected her to tell her to just get some rest. She definitely didn’t expect her to say anything... well, it could mean anything, but it’s the smirk on her face that makes her think it might mean _something_.

She’s getting a little tired of listening to grounders speak in riddles.

If she means what Clarke thinks she does, maybe Skai Kru and Tri Kru aren’t so different after all.

“Really?” She asks. She’s giving Lexa the chance to change this. Shift the tone of this conversation back to battle strategies and leadership lectures.

Lexa nods, not breaking their eye contact. She turns on her side just enough to face her. “Really.”

That’s different. Not all that surprising, if she really thinks about it. But different. She almost laughs. The Commander, of all people, suggesting... whatever it is that she’s suggesting. Pre-war stress relief of a less conventional nature, if she’s reading the situation correctly.

She’s not entirely opposed.

Clarke pushes herself away from the table and moves to stand in front of Lexa, effectively trapping her against the table. She’s free to move, if she really wanted to. She doesn’t make any effort to.

“And what would happen if I did?” As an afterthought, she adds, “Leave that choice in your hands.”

Lexa’s lips press together slightly as she swallows and locks her eyes with Clarke’s, standing up straight. “I’m not sure you’re ready to find out.”

Clarke raises her eyebrows and laughs. She can’t help it. Lexa has to know what saying that will do, there’s not a chance in hell she’ll back down now.

“Oh, you don’t think so?”

“Like I said. I’m not sure.”

That’s all it takes, really. She’d made up her mind already, maybe a long time ago, but in the end that’s what it takes for her to grab fistfuls of Lexa’s coat and close the gap between their lips.

Crashing into each other comes harshly. The moment Clarke's mouth comes down on Lexa's, she feels her hands grip at her sides, pulling her flush against Lexa's body as she kisses back. _Hard_. If the world was ending, she thinks this might be how she'd want to kiss someone in her final moments. This is how she’d want to _be_ kissed. Lexa kisses her like she's been aching for it for a century.

It doesn't take long for Clarke to lose track of time.

When she slides her hands up Lexa's shoulders and grips her by the back of her neck, they part for half a second, breathing heavily into each other's mouths and adjusting the angle of their lips. Clarke drags her nose across Lexa’s to kiss her from the other side.

Lexa has incredible lips. She already knew this, but kissing them is something else.

She takes the bottom one into her mouth and sucks on it until Lexa groans and weaves a hand through her hair. She scratches lightly at her scalp and pushes against Clarke's lips. Yeah. She gets that. She can feel what Lexa’s asking for and she wants it too, to be impossibly closer than they already are.

A spark of heat – maybe more than just a spark, maybe a flare – rocks her system when Lexa's tongue presses against her lips and she tilts her head, offering Lexa the permission she didn't need to ask for.

It builds from there. She just needs more. More kissing. More contact. More hands, more skin, more tongue, more heat.

Lexa loses her coat first. It’s big, it’s heavy, and it’s in the way, so Clarke pulls her far enough away from the table so that she can push it off of her shoulders and then step over it. Lexa stumbles backwards over the pile it makes and crashes into the table, pulling a laugh from the both of them. Lexa’s smile is infectious and more than just addicting. It dawns on her there that it’s the first time she’s seen Lexa really happy.

Their world is a little beyond fucked up, but she guesses she already knew that before she let herself get invested in Lexa.

Clarke makes quick work of the table. She pulls Lexa closer with one arm, their chests pressed together and the smile wiped off of Lexa’s face, and uses her other arm to clear a space on the table to push Lexa up onto.

Which she does. More swiftly than she knew she was capable of.

The laughing stops for a second, replaced instead with heavy looks and heavy breathing, only to start again when Lexa tries to push Clarke's jacket off and fails. She furrows her eyebrows together and tugs down on the jacket sleeves, trying to yank them off.

“It’s stuck.” She comments, and her voice is in and of itself is a turn on right now.

Clarke lets out a laugh. “It’s the gloves.” She fights with the hook under her wrist that keeps the fabric wrapped around the cuff of her jacket.

“Let me do it.” Lexa says, and she lets her. Lexa was the one who put them on her in the first place, it only makes sense that she’d know how to take them off. They’re her gloves, anyway.

She doesn’t linger and her fingers work around the gloves in seconds. Lexa yanks at one and Clarke slings the other one off by sheer force and then they’re both working at pushing her jacket off. It falls to the floor somewhere near Lexa’s coat.

And then the laughing stops for good, because Clarke catches sight of a mark on Lexa’s bicep. The tank top she wears does nothing to conceal the decent-sized tattoo, and it makes her mouth dry at the thought that she might have more. Of course she would, don’t all the grounders have tattoos? She licks her lips and allows herself to run her hands down Lexa’s arms, feeling the toned muscle underneath the ink.

The thought of Lexa’s tattoos and the various places she may or may not have them make thinking straight an impossibility.

She has no real intention of holding herself back right now, so when Lexa pulls her in by the shirt and kisses her hard, Clarke’s hands find Lexa’s legs and wrap them around her hips.

This is a position she knows she could get used to.

And the one thing she learns quickly is that Lexa has, without a doubt, done this before. The heels of her boots dig into Clarke’s lower back and she pulls her closer. She runs her hands through Clarke’s hair and deepens the kiss, pulling a low moan from the back of Clarke’s throat. She didn’t see that coming, but it’s a welcome surprise.

This whole situation is.

Everything feels good. Too good. And she can tell by the shallow breaths coming from Lexa’s mouth when Clarke kisses and nips at her neck that Lexa feels it, too. That her senses are just as overwhelmed. That her heart rate is off the charts. That she wants more than this.

More than _just_ a distraction.

But maybe not, because when Clarke slips a hand over Lexa’s leg and starts to work her way up her thigh, Lexa’s hand lets go of her grip on Clarke’s shirt and meets her halfway. She laces their fingers together and pushes their hands off of her leg, resting it on the table next to them.

Clarke takes the hint. It’s not a subtle one, and she won’t ask for another.

She pulls back and fights to get her breathing under control, letting her head rest against Lexa’s forehead. She has to get some semblance of control back. If it were up to her – if Lexa was willing – she wouldn’t have stopped until they had exhausted each other for hours. God knows she could use a night like that and God knows she wants one with Lexa, but she lets her head rest against Lexa’s neck and buries that thought in half a moment of breathing hotly against her skin. This was more than enough for the both of them.

Lexa tilts Clarke’s chin up with a single finger and falters, biting the corner of her bottom lip.

She knows Lexa’s eyes are green, but in this light all she sees is the hunger in her eyes turn soft. Her hair is out of place and most of her braids could use some attention. Her lips are bruised, her look is sweet, and her face is flushed. Clarke thinks this must be the kind of beauty people used to write poetry about.

Lexa leans forward and meets her lips again. This kiss is softer than the rest. More gentle. Her free hand meets Clarke’s other hand and their fingers intertwine messily. If their previous kisses were hot and desperate, this one is warm and comforting, born of an entirely different kind of desperation. Lexa’s thumb absentmindedly strokes across the side of Clarke’s hand. She pulls back, tilts her head, and meets Clarke's lips again after a second’s hesitation.

And that’s when she breaks. Kissing was more than enough, but this – the hands, the soft touch, the whisper of a kiss against her lips, the way she can feel Lexa tug on her heart with the way she leans against her forehead – it’s too much.

She pulls back.

“I’m sorry. Uh–” She’s not sorry, not really. Not for kissing her. She’s sorry for letting her emotions get in the way, that’s one thing she can be sure of. If she wasn’t so confused, she might have laughed at the thought of falling for the one person who refuses to let herself care for anyone.

She really has amazing luck when it comes to falling for people, doesn’t she?

“You were right.” She pushes herself away from Lexa and it’s almost cute the way she falls in on herself. Her hands grip the table where Clarke had stood and her legs swing off the edge. “I should get some rest. I still have... a lot to think about.”

Lexa just nods. She doesn’t look at her, and that’s a relief. It’s embarrassing enough to search the ground for her jacket and her gloves without Lexa’s eyes following her.

She slips the gloves back over the sleeves of her coat on the way out of the tent, only offering Lexa a forced smile and a wave before her feet carry her outside.

–

When the fresh air hits her, she couldn’t be more grateful. She needs to sit outside for a little while. She needs to clear her mind. The guard waiting outside Lexa’s tent watches her leave and she fights off a wave of embarrassment, wondering if he knew what had just happened.

–

When she finds Octavia, she decides to put everything that had happened with Lexa behind her. It’s something she can deal with after they take Mount Weather. She has more important things on her mind.

–

When Octavia accuses her of knowing about the missile, she presses her lips together and looks down at her feet. She shouldn’t have let herself get distracted like that. She knows it. Hundreds of people had just _died_. Her friends were trapped in Mount Weather. She had let a bomb drop on Lexa’s people and some of her own, just to save one life. One life that was counting on her. She didn’t deserve a distraction. She still doesn’t.

–

When Octavia promises not to say anything about the missile, Clarke barely catches the end of her sentence. Behind her, she sees Lexa coming out of her tent. Her coat is on again, every buckle and button and strap in place, as if she’d been wearing it that way all night. As if Clarke hadn’t had her hands fisted in the fabric of her shirt less than ten minutes ago. She doesn’t pay Clarke any attention, only nodding and saying, “Octavia.”

She doesn’t look at her, not until Octavia leaves and Clarke takes enough steps to stand in Lexa’s space.

“She won’t say anything.” It’s all she can say that doesn’t violate the unspoken rule between them.

“You can’t be sure of that. Too many people know, Clarke.”

It’s almost too hard to look her in the eye when Clarke turns and says, “You worry about your people, I’ll worry about mine.”

–

When they find themselves in Lexa’s tent again, there are more boundaries in place. Lexa goes to sleep, or she pretends to, and Clarke faces the table again. She scans their diorama for another plan, another strategy, a plan B, just in case it’s necessary.

She falls back on her previous thought. They could blow the doors manually. But only if Raven could get someone else to take care of cutting the power. Cutting the power isn’t a guarantee that they’ll get the doors open, but Raven is. It’s nowhere near stealthy, though. They need stealth to win. They can’t imagine the technology the Mountain Men might have and the casualties they could face – it’s not the best plan. But they might have to keep it as an option. If those locks don’t disengage, they have nothing. No way in.

–

When her eyes start to burn of sleep deprivation, she finds herself outside again. Sleeping isn’t much of an option. Not with Lexa, anyway. Just days ago, she’d had no issue falling asleep next to her. Things are different now.

–

When she finds Lexa’s guard with an arrow pointed at Octavia, she realizes how seriously Lexa takes her position.

She marches him into Lexa’s tent, of course, and doesn’t hesitate to give her a piece of her mind.

When Lexa says “Nothing has changed,” Clarke can’t help but wonder if they’re still talking about Octavia.

Lexa looks up the second she offers back, “You’re wrong,” And that’s when she knows they’re not talking about Octavia. “I have,’ she adds, and it seems to relax her.

When they argue, Lexa is closed off. It’s a sick kind of irony that the first time Clarke starts to really feel something for Lexa is the first time Lexa shuts her off completely.

When she backs her into the table – the _same_ table, and she can see in Lexa’s eyes that she _knows_ that – she finally understands why.

“Not everyone. Not you.”

Clarke reels back because it makes sense. The way her eyes soften isn’t unlike the way they had hours ago.

Oh. She really should have known.

–

When one of Lexa’s generals finds her at the edge of the camp, she’s told that Lexa has sent for her.

When Lexa looks at her, she can see that she’s as nervous as Clarke feels.

When Lexa says, “You think our ways are harsh, but it’s how we survive,” All she can see is the way that their hands had intertwined in the dark. All she can feel is the warmth of Lexa’s skin against hers.

It’s what she thinks of when she looks at her.

“Maybe life should be about more than _just_ surviving.”

She hopes it’s all Lexa thinks of when she says, “Don’t we deserve better than that?”

When Lexa kisses her, she knows it is.

**Author's Note:**

> i highly recommend you rewatch 2.14 with this scenario in mind, it's great for a laugh and its hilarious how well it fits.


End file.
